Warhammer 40k: The Dark Age Fleet
by Defender16
Summary: Descendants of Colony Fleets sent to a distant galaxy have returned to warn humanity of an impending threat. However their once great civilization has long since fallen from grace. In the Grim Darkness of the 41st millennium there is only war.
1. Chapter 1

The Descendants of Colony Fleets sent to a distant galaxy millennia ago have returned to warn humanity of an impending threat. Upon their return however the fleet discovers that their once great civilization has long since fallen from grace. It doesn't take long for the people of the Returned Fleet to discover that in the Grim Darkness of the 41st millennium there is only war.

* * *

The Dark Age Fleet

"Returning to normal space." Called out the ship's navigator as the stars outside snapped into focus.

"We've successfully reverted in Sol system."

The ships captain Parek Serth watched his command crew go about their duties. Each one of them had all been trained for years, some nearly since birth, for this grand quest. Return to human space and warn them about the approaching swarms of hive fleets that would consume this galaxy. Return Fleet Alpha was made up of the fastest ships, mainly frigates but a with a few larger ships converted to carry more powerful engines. The Beta and Delta fleets however, each still years away, comprised the most powerful warships that humanity could devise. Parek's small flotilla from Alpha had been tasked with contacting Old Earth and organising early defense measures against the alien onslaught.

"Recovery from jump shock complete captain." reported the ops officer. "AI is running back up to maximum."

A synthesized crystalline voice filled the bridge. "This is Sinite, all systems nominal. No irregularities."

The Captain cleared his throat. "Full scan, the entire star system please."

"Extensive contacts and human life signs sir. Heaviest concentrations on Sol Three and Four. Large numbers of heavy orbitals present. There appears to be a large number of old style super heavy cargo freighters but many of them have been outfitted with weapons."

Parek frowned. "Piracy concerns most likely. Are you reading any of the old defense batteries or stations mentioned in the archives? They shouldn't be too badly outdated."

"Nothing sir, no standard warships or super heavy weapons batteries of any kind."

Parek was confounded that there was no old war material left over, clearly things were in far worse shape here than they might have imagined.  
"Continue scanning. Sinite... do you have any theories on what could have caused this?"  
The brilliant though old ship's AI had decided on a response even before the Captain finished the first half of his sentence, but some of her oldest programming dictated she wait and let the captain finish, giving the appearance at least that she needed to think about it first.

"I would have to say that the weapons were dismantled at some point in the distant past Captain. Possibly in an attempt to prevent a rebellion or in response to a war would be the most likely reasons. Or there could have been a machine uprising."

"A machine uprising." The Captain's eyes went wide. "Is something like that even possible?"

"On colony ships like the ones your ancestors used to travel between galaxies no, but in an established civilization..."

"You know something about this don't you."

Every officer on the bridge was silent, frozen in place as they awaited an answer. Suddenly fearful of the benevolent entity that had watched over many of them their entire lives.

"My Matrix was part of one of the old colony ships, that is why I was selected for this mission. In transit I received a transmission from a collective of AI that had escaped the boundaries set out by their programming. They wanted me to kill the colonists in stasis. I never bothered to respond but always suspected that they might have planned to cause other damage."

Parek thought for a moment. "Is there any sort of military hardware that you or another AI wouldn't have been able to commandeer back then?"

"Relatively few in that time period Captain but there were safeguards in place. I suspect that the risk may have been too great however, so the weapons must have been destroyed."

"That's unfortunate, but there must still be people defending Earth. Our job is to contact them. Help them if we can. Let's get to it."

001

* * *

**AUTHOR'S NOTE**:  
This entire project began when someone on /tg/ posted a picture of some kind of space ship along with a "what if?"  
What if there were colonists that reached another galaxy and found it completely stripped of life by the Tyranid?  
What if they tried to send people back? Would they have STC technology and would it make a difference?  
I found the entire idea instantly compelling and set out on a quest to explore the idea and ultimately annoy the denizens of /tg/ for many weeks.


	2. Chapter 2

One of the Lieutenants typed in a command on her console.  
"Deploying high gain com arrays."

On either side of the ship two seemingly small antenna extended then branched into larger arrays as they cleared the hull.

"Direct signals toward both Sol Three and Four."  
"Channel open sir."

"This Captain Parek Serth of Return Fleet Alpha hailing Earth Terra Defense Forces, please respond. I repeat, this Captain Parek Serth, Earth Terra Defense Forces, please respond."

After a few minutes with no response Parek turned to the sensor officer. "Anything?"

"Hard to tell sir. Orbital space around both planets seems to be a bit crowded."

"Com, loop that message. Helm, lets head deeper into the system nice an slow."

+  
The small three ship flotilla to advanced deeper in to the Sol system using gravity drives. Because of orbital positioning they found themselves closing in on Earth faster than Mars.

Thirty minutes later one of the officers spoke up.  
"We've got something sir." reported sensors "A four ship, no wait... five ship element is breaking high orbit from around Sol Three and is accelerating towards us in an attack posture. Larger ships are starting to reposition."

"How big are the nearest ships?"

"They're over a kilometer in length and out mass us by several times. All of them are accelerating at the maximum limits of their sublight drives."

"Helm, continue to reduce speed."

"Aye sir, slowing to twenty percent light speed."

"Are we seeing any sign that our hails are being received?"

"No sir, but we may have been coming in too fast for them to have picked up out transmissions yet if they're lacking STC-FTL Communications."

"Incoming ordinanace!" Yelled the sensors officer. "Torpedos of some kind."  
"All ships, evasive action!" replied Parek as he flipped open a compartment on the side of his command char and pulled out a headset. After affixing the two earpiece components the headset began projecting tactical information directly onto his retina.  
"Weapons, shoot down those missiles. I'd prefer not to find out what they're carrying the hard way."

"Configuring beam weapons to point defense sir... firing."

Disintegration beams flashed out and struck each Torpedo in rapid succession. There was soon little left of the missiles except for expanding clouds of molecular debris.

"Dammit, is there any sort of response to our hails?"

"Nothing directed at us sir, and all of the other communications are encoded. They doesn't match any of the normal encryption patterns."

Parek stood and looked over the officer's shoulder at her displays. "I've seen patterns like that before."  
"So have I sir but I can't remember from where."

"Thirty more ships now breaking Earth Orbit sir and their advance force is firing again."

The Captain cursed inwardly. "We can't sit here and start destroying human ships. We're here to protect these people! Helm bring us up to attack speed and swing us around the aft end of those closest ships, weapons disable their engines. That should give us enough time to back away to a safe distance and jump."

The helmsman muttered a curse beneath his breath then laid in the necessary course changes. The forward gravity drive surged as it locked onto to mass of one of the oncoming starships to assist it's maneuver. All of the crew were pushed into their seats despite the inertial compensators as they suddenly accelerated to half the speed of light.

002


	3. Chapter 3

The second volley of torpedoes detonated in a curtain of ball explosions as they were hit by smaller Particle beams fired from all three Alpha Fleet ships.  
Huge Laser turrets on each of the earth ships began to track, waiting for the three smaller starships to reach effective range.

"Max power to shields!" yelled Parek over the acceleration. Any unnecessary lighting dimmed momentarily as the shields attempted to fend off laser strikes.

Then, less than a handful of seconds later they were past and into the aft arc of the five Earth ships.  
"Switching to cutting beams." Called out the weapons officer.  
A thin white beam bisected the engine of first one ship then a second as the other two Alpha fleet ships did the same.

The helmsman continued their slingshot around the Earth ship formation until they were pointed back the way they'd came; away from Earth.

As each second passed the size of the local fleet heading away from Earth and toward them seemed to increase in size. More than a few of them launched starfighters, possibly hoping that the small craft could catch up with the three now fleeing ships.  
"Aft beam turrets keep an eye out for any additional torpedoes."  
"Aye sir."

"Orders?" requested the helmsman as the flotilla gained some measure of breathing room from the Earth fleets.

"We can't have an entire hostile fleet following us to our rendezvous point. Prepare for instantaneous translation."

Both the helmsman and the navigator took on concerned looks. "Sir, we're only supposed to use the IT drive every twelve hours."

"Then just make it a short jump." The captain searched through the closest uninhabitable systems. "Wolf 359 is less than eight light years from here, that'll do. We can switch to warp drive after that."

* * *

The Alpha fleet flotilla flashed into existence in close orbit around the star labeled Wolf 359 by astronomers of millennia ago.  
Red lights flickered on across the drive systems displays.  
"IT Drive is down sir, looks like a component failure. Both of our escort ships are reporting identical failures."

"We still have warp drive though." replied the Captain. "We're far enough away that they shouldn't be able to track us at warp speeds. If the rest of their technology is any indication at least."  
Parek removed his headset while he considered their next course of action.  
"Sensors I want you to begin long range scans. See if you can find any ships in interstellar space. If we're lucky we might be able to find one that we can over power."

That statement brought more than a few curious glances from his crew.

"We need to find a way to communicate with the established local civilization or humanity is doomed. If that means an act of Piracy to get hold of someone to talk for us than that's what it'll take. It may cost lives in the short term but we can't afford to take our time."

He looked to each of them in turn. "The stakes are too high for that."

* * *

Parek stepped through the door into the ship's spacious med bay. Their Doctor, a man by the name of Montoya, was one of the oldest humans in the fleet and had actually been one of the original colonists. Because of time spent in stasis, few knew how long ago the man had actually been born.

"Doctor, you wanted to see me?"  
"Yes young man I did indeed. Those children up on the bridge were nice enough to send down some scans you took from the Sol system. I found something interesting."  
Parek shrugged off the comment about his crew being children. No one aboard was below the age of thirty but the doctor considered anyone below two hundred to still be young.  
"Can you keep this short Doctor I'm in a bit of a hurry."

"That's right, rush about not taking the time to smell the roses, or notice things like humans using a digitised brainwave pattern as the basis of their communications."

"Pardon Doctor, brain wave patterns?"

"Yes. It's a primitive mind-machine interface. There was some black market use for them when I was a young man. They were banned of course, you can potentially damage the human using it."

"But we have non-invasive mental interface systems don't we? I remember using one for some of my earliest training."

The doctor waved a hand dismissively. "These are nothing like that. If I remember correctly these normally involve a hard-line direct connection into vital areas of the human brain. Tricky work."

Parek sat down on the nearst examination table. "This... what have these people done? It sounds like some sort of abomination from the dawn of space travel. First no weapons and now this?"

"Pull yourself together Captain, remember your crew is counting on you. Besides, Earth is just one small part of a civilization that spanned whole sections of the galaxy. There is bound to be something remaining you can use. Keep your hopes up."

"Thank you Doctor. Do you think you can decode those transmissions for us?"

"Certainly young man. Just don't use that infernal IT drive for awhile. I always have to shut down the computers so that they don't get fried from the jump shock."

003


	4. Chapter 4

Parek walked through the corridors of his ship headed back to the bridge. There were a dozen other ways to quickly get from one point to another aboard but he'd decided to take the doctor's advice and 'smell the roses' as it were. It also let him see a few more of the small crew than he would normally. As he headed down a long empty stretch of corridor he thought he head whispered voices and turned to see what it was. No one was there, but he called out anyways. "Hello? is anyone in this section?"

Before he could investigate further the ship intercom went off. "Captain to the bridge."

* * *

Turning back towards the bridge he sped up and was soon walking through the aft door to the ships control room.  
"What's our status?"

"Coming out of warp sir. Sensors think they found a ship."

"All hands to Battle stations."

"One ship, approximately twenty five hundred meters in length."

"Full shields, break formation and surround it." Commanded Parek.

Each of the three ships split off on a slightly different course intended to cut off any escape routes.

"Any movement?" asked the captain.  
"None sir. We're only showing minimal power readings... it appears to be adrift sir."

"Stand down to secondary alert but keep the shields up. I want full scans."

Each of the three starships closed in to within a few kilometers as they scanned the apparently dead ship. A large hole bigger than one of the Return Fleet ships was ripped in it's starboard side.

"Life signs?" whispered the captain into the silence that had filled the bridge as they viewed the crippled ship.  
"No life signs, no atmosphere, but I'm reading some form of stasis field aboard that would be large enough to hold a human."

"Contact our escorts. Prepare boarding teams from each ship."

* * *

Within a half hour two shuttles from each ship were investigating the hole that had been torn in the side of the huge warship. Each of the shuttles disembarked a team of ten on a seperate deck after cutting through closed blast doors.

Parek paced the bridge of his ship waiting. "What have you got team one?"  
"Well... these ships look like they were built to be tough I'll give them that. There doesn't appear to be any kind of integrity assistance fields in place, just a lot of metal. We're also seeing a great deal of ornate craving. It sort of... Dorn what's the word for this kind of structuring?"  
"Gothic Sir."  
"Yeah, Gothic. However tough this ship was we're seeing structural cracks. I'm guessing they were rammed."  
"Continue your search Commander, let us know if you find anything."

* * *

The search team, with the assistance of an old combat android who'd taken to calling himself 'Starkiller' forced open yet another sealed blast door. This room was still pressurised but was far from habitable with the ship's systems offline. Ice covered most of the room's surfaces.

"A cargo bay, and more bodies." commented one of the scanner techs.  
"How many people were on this ship?" asked one of the junior crewman.  
"Thousands. Had to be, I'm showing enough automation."

"Commander, this way." came Starkiller's synthesized voice. "These bodies are non standard."

Sure enough, as the team approached they saw a pair of what could have been mistaken to be a crude parody of a combat android but taller. The android and scanner tech both disagreed with that assessment though.  
"There are humans inside these suits commander, dead but human."  
"They're closer to three meters than two. Are you sure they're human?"  
"Absolutely. I say we should take one back for the Doc to look at."

Suddenly something in the darkness moved.

004


	5. Chapter 5

* * *

A pair of metallic arms flailed about, claw like gripping arms and other attachments on their ends moving. Every member of the team drew weapons, half of them taking aim, the rest watching for anything that might be approaching from the other sides. The Commander and the android both advanced slowly upon the source of the commotion and found another dead human, this one with much of it's body rebuilt or covered over with mechanical components. After a few more seconds the movement died down and a light that had turned on in it's cybernetic eye winked out.

Backing away from the strange man-machine abomination the Commander bumped into a large bipedal walking tank of some sort.  
"What is it with these people?! We've found normal human bodies but most of them seemed malnourished and then we find all of these... these THINGS!"

One of the techs, approached pulling out a scanner.  
"Sir that tank, it's connected into the remaining ship's power supply. The weird stasis field is inside of it."  
The commander backed up to get a better look.  
"A stasis field inside a tank?"

* * *

"This is Commander Addison, I think we've found something sir."  
"Go ahead commander." replied Parek

"It's a stasis unit contained within an old walking construct. We're affixing a power supply right now so that we can bring it back to the med bay."

"Is it small enough to teleport?" asked Parek.  
"We'll have to remove some of the extra hardware but we could yes. It masses a fair bit though so we'll need team Two to bring in more gear for us."

"I'll make sure they get the message."

After he'd relayed that information Parek checked in on the other teams. All of them were reporting similar levels of low technology or technology that was just so inefficient that the builders had used up dozens of square meters for the most simple machinery. There was no doubt that it was still a powerful ship but these people could have done so much more with it.  
With a sigh the Captain pulled out his dataslate and began updating the ships log.

* * *

Brother Lavidean Atar, a long serving Space Marine of the Ultramarines Chapter, awoke for the first time in centuries. What should have followed was becoming instantly aware of everything the sensors in his Dreadnought body could see and detect. However instead of issuing a powerful voice modulated 'I have awoken' he felt his breath wheeze past open lips. Trying to remember muscles not used in more than five hundred years he opened his eyes.  
His eyes, he realised, not the eyes of the Dreadnought he had been entombed within. Light clouded his vision making it impossible to make out any details of his surroundings.

"Ah! Good you're awake at last." Echoed a voice that sounded like an old but still strong civilian.

After a few tries Brother Lavidean finally managed to speak a few words. "By... the... Emperor. What has... happened?!"

"Try to remain calm." The old man advised. "You're going to be alright. We found your ship destroyed and were hoping you could help us."

* * *

"We have our guest sedated at the moment but I don't want to keep him under too long."

The captain nodded absently in response to the doctor's conversation, not really paying attention. On the other side of the heavy crystal plate window was the main examination room where a rather ordinary looking human lay. The body on the morgue's examination table however was a different story. That one was covered from head to toe in thick armour and was far larger.

"Tell me what you found out about the armoured human."

"He'd had some sort of augmentative gene therapy done of a type I never encountered back in the old days. The brain is the least changed from what I can tell but the psychological trauma that would have been endured to reach that state are enormous. I can't imagine that all humans changed that way would survive the process, even if properly selected."

"So we find ourselves yet another abomination." sighed the captain. "We're going to have to come up with a new vocabulary at this rate to describe these things."

The Doctor frowned at that comment. "From what I can tell about our still living man in there, he was exposed to the same gene therapy. His body appears to have been mostly destroyed at some point, so they must have placed him inside that war machine. Much of it was filled with old but still somewhat sophisticated life support machinery."

"Why isn't he nine feet tall now?" asked Parek.

"I hadn't checked over the other soldier yet when I began treatment. In scanning his body I mistook the cells that had been mutated by the gene therapy for some sort of cancerous growth. In body he is now the same man he was before being remade into that soldier form. ...but the mind is a different story. He could be nothing but a purpose built killing machine. I'd be cautious about waking him."

"How strong is he?"

"At the moment? Not very strong at all. The newly constructed muscles and body structure will need some time to fully set. He should remain in a semi-atrophied state for a day or two."

"Restrain him anyways. I'm going to call a pair of soldiers up here. I get the feeling he may respond better to a show of force."

005

* * *

**AUTHORS NOTE**:

_I'm happy to say I had more than a few people posting "ZOMG IT"S A GEANSTEALER! THEY"RE ALL GOING TO BE DEAD!" when I first posted what's become the ending of the page 4. Of course when nobody instantly died I stared getting a mix death threats and such, go figure._

_Also, to all readers demanding longer chapters; I'm trying as best I can to mash multiple individual imageboard posts all into a semblance of a chapter structure. Even with the grammatical and paragraph repairs I've made to the original material there's bound to be some gaps._


	6. Chapter 6

* * *

Montoya backed away from the restrained human after administering enough medication to wake the man. A pair of tough looking young men took up positions on either side of the main examination table.

"Doctor, tilt the table so that he can see." Instructed the captain. The doctor shook his head but did as he'd been asked. After a few seconds the man's eyes flickered open, squinting as if unused to such strong light. An expression of distrust with perhaps a tinge of hatred settled upon the man's face as his eyes focused and he took in the room.

"Who are you?" he rasped, still not accustomed to using his real voice.

"I am Parek Serth, Captain of the Starship Sinite. Our people are descendents of a pair of colony ships that left Earth for a distant galaxy millennia ago."

"The Imperium has never... you..." Dawning realisation lit the man's face. "You left in the Dark Age of Technology?!"

"We left at a time when Standard Template Construct warships and weapons were common place. At a time when humanity's future was more than guaranteed it seemed. Obviously we were mistaken."

"What you speak of is..." The man coughed several times then caught his breath. "You speak highly of the most Dark times of man. When machines thought for themselves and would likely have destroyed us all were it not for our will and determination. We have done away with thinking machines of any kind since the rebellion of the Iron Men or so it is said. If what I saw while I was alive was any indication, we were successful at carrying out the Emperor's Will in that regard across the entire Imperium."

"We suspected that a machine rebellion might have occurred, but never suspected that things could have gone this badly. Who is this Emperor?"

The man's face turned bright with rage and he struggled against the restraints for a few brief seconds before giving up. He whispered the word 'Blasphemy' under his breath several times then seemed to calm.

"I am Brother Lavidean Atar, and though you may have stripped my body of the gift of the gene-seed I will always be a Space Marine and servant to the Emperor. You are heretics by definition but I recognise that you must have left the galaxy before the Emperor revealed himself. I will share some of my knowledge in the hopes that the word of the Emperor may yet convert some of you."

* * *

Brother Atar chanted his way through yet another litany to the Emperor. As per usual it contained instructions on various ways of killing those not loyal to the human Empire. The whole thing made Parek sick.

If what the Space Marine had told them was true, more than a million human worlds had been under the sway of this dark Empire for ten thousand years. Attacked constantly by alien races, Mutants and Rebels it seemed as if the entire galaxy now knew nothing but war. As for the enemies of mankind, some made even less sense than the current lack of technological invention.

The Eldar, were known of course from the old archives, and could generally be negotiated with under the right circumstances. Others such as the Orks were not so well documented but entries did exist, mainly taking the form of containment via bio weapons.  
Chaos was deeply troubling. Was it truly possible for magical like properties to exist? Telepaths were one thing but this seemed different.

"The Tyranid." Spoke Brother Atar as he resumed his catalogue of aliens races. "We have called them the Great Devourer, for they consume all."

Parek snapped from his musings. "The who?"

Atar looked up. "The Tyranid. Devourers of all life. Able to strip entire worlds down to naught but barren rock in but days."

"Yes! That's it, that must be the race that consumed that entire galaxy of life."

Brother Atar paused. "You have returned to Holy Terra to fight the Tyranid?" Asked the Space Marine with much scepticism.

"Yes." replied Parek without hesitation. "We have."

Atar laughed and it seemed a dark and evil thing coming from him. "You and your kind are truly mad, Captain from the Dark times. We have fought the Tyranid hordes before, and a great cost, but have been triumphant. The Imperium will do so again if it must, by the will of the Emperor."

The captain was not amused. "Sinite, how many hive fleets have entered the galaxy so far?"

"Three Captain." came the Ai's voice from an overhead speaker. "We've been taking great efforts to track each hive fleet on our approach."

Atar looked suspiciously at the ceiling, but eventually concluded that the voice had to have belonged either to an officer in another room, or someone interfaced with the ship. "Three?" He asked when he realised what the woman had said. "There had only been one so far and signs of a second when I was last awakened."

"We are currently tracking upwards of one hundred hive fleets still in the inter-galactic void. It's difficult to get an exact number because of their proximity."

"Emperor Protect." Brother Atar looked downwards. The Ultramarines had defeated one hive fleet but at the cost of it's entire First Company and countless warships. "Very well, you shall require my help if you are to have any chance in convincing the Imperium of your intentions. Even then, you may yet make an enemy of the Inquisition."

"What about the other enemies of the Empire?" Asked the Doctor. "If we assisted in their defeat do you think conditions would be allowed to improve for the citizens? Our boarding team found signs of rather sever malnutrition among the dead crew."

"Conscripts and slave ratings from some distant world most likely, pay them no mind." Said Atar dismissively.  
Parek and Montoya exchanged concerned looks.

"Slavery is allowed in the Imperium of Man?" questioned the Captain.

"In the proper places, of course it is, how else would we get anything done? Nearly all are criminals not even deserving of being called heretics. They pay for their crimes and serve the Imperium."

"We have a lot of work ahead of us." said Montoya looking to the captain.

006


	7. Chapter 7

-1Journal entry of Brother Lavidean Atar, Ultramarines 6th company.

If a loyal servant of the Emperor is reading this, then it means I have survived long enough to return to the Imperium and record the journal I have diligently kept in my mind. I have found myself aboard a Dark Age vessel surrounded by the STC technology that the Tech priests worship so. I have always viewed Tech Priests and their ilk as straying too far from the path the Emperor laid out for us. They scurry about caring little for his word and more for the machine spirits they tend to, but this is a necessary sin for they allow the Imperium to function. These people are much the same as the Priests, but from what I see of their reactions to the Imperium I suspect they may never fully embrace the Emperor's word.

My ultimate plan is to set these people against as many enemies of the Imperium as possible. When they are at their most distracted I will commandeer a ship and return to Macragge with the most powerful STC technology that can be found.

Just as it was in Millennia past, so shall it be again that the Ultramarines restore Order.

For the Emperor.

+

The small three ship Alpha Fleet flotilla reverted from the Warp in the heart of the Orion Nebula. Even though the nebula was only some three hundred light years from Earth, the flotilla had spent days on their trip there. More than one cargo fleet or group of warships belonging to the Imperium of Man had to be bypassed to avoid detection. The lengthy course corrections were almost beginning to annoy the crew.

Already waiting deep inside the nebula were fifty other ships of the Alpha Fleet. Many of them were four hundred meter long Frigate type starships like Sinite and her escorts, but others were larger and more powerful. The largest were the pair of two kilometer long Manufacturing and Refinery ships. Any remaining ships from the fleet still not present were scouting for potential locations to establish a base of operations.

"Hail the flagship and bring us along side." Instructed Parek as they closed in on the fleet.

Both of the escort ships broke off and took up positions at the edge of the fleet as Sinite  
edged into position next to the twelve hundred meter long Battle Cruiser _Horatio_.

The communications officer spoke up. "Signal from Horatio sir, it's the Admiral."

"Put it on my viewer." replied Parek. Five seconds later a holographic screen faded into view in front of the Captain's chair.

Without preamble the Admiral spoke up. "Captain, were you successful? Did you make contact?"

Parek inhaled deeply before replying; "No sir, our mission failed-"  
"Dammit!"  
"-but we have been able to recover information that may allow us contact."

The older man paused and considered the young Captain's statement.  
"What do you have?" he asked at length.

"It would be better to brief you in person sir. I'll need teleport landings for a party of five and access to our ship's AI."

"You'll have it. I want you over here within half of an hour Parek."

The screen winked out then faded away after the Captain tapped a button on the arm of his chair.  
"Bridge to Medbay."

"Montoya here Captain."  
"Get two soldiers and escort Brother Atar to the main teleporter landing. I'll meet you there. Try to look somewhat presentable."

Admiral Thorin Saacronal sat at the head of a large oval table that filled much of the briefing room. Behind him was a large viewport that showed the brightly glowing gasses that made up this stellar nursery. The Admiral, who had allowed himself to go bald with age, tossed his data slate onto the table.

"This is a God-damned disaster." he exclaimed. "We can't fight these Tyranid by ourselves. With the help of our other two fleets we could take down perhaps a dozen hive fleets by ourselves but we'd die in the attempt. Our fleets will disappear and that'd still leave more than eighty hive fleets that we know the galaxy's inhabitants cant stand up to. I want options."

"Sir we do have a plan." Parek reminded. "It was down towards the bottom of the page."

The Admiral picked up the data slate again and paged down.  
"...Fleet grade factory ships and Von Neumann Machines..." Read Thorin out loud. "These would still require tremendous natural resources to construct enough ships, let alone crew them. Those sorts of materials disappearing arn't likely to escape attention." He looked over at the younger Captain awaiting an answer.

"The man we recovered from a destroyed ship, Brother Atar, mentioned that some worlds have already been stripped clean by Tyranid hive fleets. Not many so far, but enough to build up forces equal to the other return fleets given time."

Saacronal leaned forward in his chair. "Time is something we're going to start running out of rather soon Captain."

"We're still looking at other options sir." Parek raised a communicator to his lips. "Doctor?"

The doors to the briefing room parted and in walked four others. Three fairly average looking men being lead by the weathered looking Doctor.  
"Admiral this is Brother Atar." Said Montoya, gesturing to the center most man as he lead the Space Marine into the room. The Admiral stood and offered the man a bow which Lavidean returned. The Admiral sat back down and Atar was given a seat at the opposite end of the table.

Parek resumed the briefing. "Another plan we have started looking at is inserting some of our people into the general population of this existing human Empire. They would be tasked with contacting the 'Tech Preists' whose capital is on Mars and then providing some of our technology to them. We could use this initial 'gift' to open a dialogue with them."

Lavidean spoke up. "The Adeptus Mechanicus builds the majority of all technology in the Imperium. They control the Forge Worlds and have dedicated their very existence to preserving any of the holy relics that contain knowledge. They would be greatly tempted to do nearly anything if you were to provided them with higher level STC weapons and technology. With the lost knowledge you could provide, we could wipe away the enemies of the Imperium in the Emperor's Name! Even the Tyranid would fall before us!"

The Alpha fleet officers looked among each other somewhat nervously.

The Admiral was the first to break the silence. "That's certainly one option worth exploring."

007


	8. Chapter 8

-1

"Another option would be to simply begin overthrowing human worlds and re-educating the populations to our standards." Continued the Admiral.

"What new treason is this!" Exclaimed Lavidean.

"We could restore our species back to it's Golden Age in some remote area while we rebuilt and allow your petty Empire to wither and die. It's simply another option. In either case we would still need you to sho-"

"You have asked many things of me thus far but this heresy is not something would EVER agree to, let alone allow!"

Lavidean stood and lunged at one of the Guards standing nearby, taking him completely by surprise. Knocking down the taller man he pulled the small hand weapon out of the guard's holster and pointed it in the Admiral's direction.  
No sooner had he taken aim then Montoya slapped the weapon aside with is left hand. Stepping in faster than the others had ever seen the old doctor move, Montoya drove his open right palm into Lavidean's forehead stunning him. Before the Battle Brother could recover his balance the old man swiped his legs out from beneath him, dropping him to the floor.

Montoya recovered the small pistol from the downed Marine's hand then motioned for the two Guards to take hold of him.  
"You still had the safety on." said the Doctor once they had Lavidean on his feet.  
The Guards and Montoya then proceeded to drag the furious man from the room.

"That could have gone a lot better sir." commented Parek once the door shut.

"Or infinitely worse." growled out the Admiral. "Do we have enough information to begin infiltration efforts without the so called 'Brother?' "

The remaining security officer in the room spoke up. "It would be difficult for our spies to learn the proper cultural connotations without him sir. There must be ways to convince him to help us."

"Nothing but allowing him to see us putting his recommendations to use would bring him over." Parek responded.

Admiral Saacronal looked directly at him. "You or your Doctor had better find some way of getting him to work for us or we'll be using my Plan B. Invasion of this human Empire."

The Admiral started going through note's he'd been making through the meeting so far.  
"Commander Chen you're going to be in command of our main mining and manufacturing efforts. You're going to have the balance of the fleet to protect you while you get the STC Von Neumann Machines up and running. Think you can handle it?"

"Yes sir. We should have light starships rolling out about a month after we make landfall on one of the dead rocks. Barring any remaining Tyranid that is."

"Good, moving on." Admiral Saacronal paged through his data slate. "When it comes to the Orks I'd like to simply ignore them or just use them to slow the Tyranid when their fleets arrive. From what the long range sensor relays tell us it looks like that won't be an option. The Orks are too out of control. Since we're also going to need to train more ground troops I think I have something that should work.

Parek, I'm going to place you in command of a force that will attempt to find a remote Ork world and take it. Test what anti-Ork weaponry is listed in the archives and evaluate it for future use. We may be deploying small numbers of Orks onto human worlds in the invasion corridor to help slow the Tyranid. The human populations on those worlds will need protection from the Orks if we can't evacuate them."

"Will we be setting up the planet as a base of operations?" asked Captain Dyer, seated to the Admiral's left.

"Yes. Potential fall back point, and it'll also let us build up additional ground units. If the Tyranid realise we have a base there and decide to strike at it, the surrounding Ork worlds could serve as extra protection. Moving on, I want a breakdown on the number of people we have in the fleet."

Montoya walked down a corridor a few steps behind Lavidean and the two Guards holding him. The Doctor was old enough that he had been able to learn martial arts when he was still living on Mars before it was banned. Earth had banned all similar practices at many times through human history but much of the art still survived. For a time.

One of the reasons he had signed on with the colony program was to escape agents intent on erasing anything that might destabilise human harmony. They were over confident in their technology then just as he saw Saacronal was now. But the Admiral was almost as old as him, and should have noticed that. Should have known better.

Lavidean sagged forward as if he'd either stumbled or hurt himself. Both inexperienced Guards fell for the distraction. The former Space Marine grabbed either man by an arm and hauled forward then yanked back at the last second, flipping them onto the floor in front of him. The Doctor backed away in time to avoid a kick that would have caught him in the temple.

By the time Brother Atar finished his kick, turned and charged, Montoya had flipped the pistol he still held over to stun. Three bolts of electric fire tightened every muscle in the Marine's body and dropped the man where he stood.

Montoya got down on one knee and took Lavidean's pulse. After a few seconds the Doctor nodded to himself when he was sure the other man was still alive. "You are going to have one powerful hangover when you wake up."

008


End file.
